474. Blood Debt, Paid in Full!

"You're not Quade!"

"Who are you?!"

Too early. Not the fraud downstairs—Padrek Vasquez, that second-rate warlock... Allen paid no attention to the shouting echoing in his ears.

He seized the opportunity as the other warlocks in the lab instinctively turned their attention toward Danthe, who radiated greater threat.

With cold precision, Allen slipped past two steel tables littered with bloodied scalpels, tweezers, and bone saws. He dodged the acrid stench in the air as he deftly vaulted over a dormant distillation vessel, shoved aside a young warlock who wore no trigger gem...

In a split second—

With his right hand, guided by the magical glow visible through the Wolf Medallion's vision, Allen ripped off the ruby bird-shaped cufflink from the goateed warlock's right wrist.

Simultaneously, his left hand darted unhesitatingly toward the oldest-looking warlock in the lab.

And at that moment—

"Splat~"

"Splat~"

Danthe burst through the lab doors. With twin slashes of his blades, two astonished heads were sent flying from their shoulders.

Scarlet blood spurted from their necks, splashing up to the ceiling.

Two down—four left.

"Rip!"

The green gem cufflink on the older warlock's right wrist was yanked free along with a strip of white cloth.

Only now did the middle-aged warlock react with a violent jerk—his left wrist, adorned with an emerald-cut gem, flared brilliantly just a finger's breadth away from Allen's outstretched hand.

"Clink!"

The gem shattered. A shimmering teal aura cloaked his bloodstained white lab coat.

Allen pulled back his empty left hand and clenched his right into a fist.

The air rippled.

A longsword etched with arcane runes—reflecting a soft, crescent-like glow—manifested in his grip. He spun and raised it high, then brought it crashing down.

"No!"

The warlock flinched, not in fear, but in rage. But Allen wouldn't be stopped by fury.

The sword cleaved through the air with a shrill screech.

With a piercing shriek, the teal aura around the warlock shattered, unleashing a powerful shockwave.

The sealed lab vibrated violently. Steel tables were flung aside; scalpels, tweezers, and bone saws launched through the air, smashing into the walls with a deafening crash before collapsing in pieces.

Glass jars exploded—spilling grotesque contents: organs, fetuses, blood, chemical solutions, and corrosive acids.

Fluids hissed and sizzled as they ate through the floor.

The middle-aged warlock remained upright, but the other three survivors were flung aside by the blast, screaming.

Allen wasn't spared either. The shockwave tore his ill-fitting lab coat, and the Quen Sign flickered on his dark red leather armor.

But he was prepared.

Twisting with the force, he let it carry him upward—redirecting momentum.

Midair, he locked eyes with the terrified goateed warlock.

A sharp spin. A swift, precise slash from his forearm—

Silver light met crimson spray.

Before the warlock could even raise a finger to chant, Allen's blade lopped off his head.

Landing with a thud, he charged forward without pause, blade plunging into Elisha's chest.

Still dazed by the shockwave, Elisha could only widen his eyes in horror as the silvery blade pierced within half a meter of his heart.

"Watch out, Allen!"

Danthe's shout rang out, the urgency mirrored by the surge of danger that made Allen's hair stand on end.

In a flash, he scanned his surroundings, kicked a bolted-down steel bench, and pivoted mid-swing to convert his thrust into a sweeping arc.

"Zzzrrrt—!"

A bolt of lightning struck the empty bench—less a seat and more a torture rack, riddled with needles and iron restraints—splitting it in half.

The explosion was deafening. The steel melted into glowing slag.

Allen rolled across the floor to avoid the blast and grabbed Danthe's outstretched hand to stand.

"That new potion of yours... packs a punch."

Danthe exhaled heavily, crossing both hands in front of him as he summoned a faint purple shield with the Yrden Sign—barely deflecting a second lightning strike.

The icy blue glow in their eyes began to fade.

The effects of the Blizzard potion had finally worn off.

At last—

Allen managed a breath, and after nearly six months, laid eyes on Bond once again.

Bond sat slumped against the wall near the door, unconscious.

He was alive—but so pale from blood loss he could have passed for a corpse. His breathing was faint—Allen had to sharpen his senses just to hear it.

He wasn't wearing the standard Wolf School leather. His wrists and ankles bore deep bruises and torn skin from struggling against restraints. His bare body was covered in needle marks—large enough to be seen from a distance.

Most wounds hadn't healed, but they weren't bleeding—likely because he had little blood left to give.

It was obvious he had been strapped to that torture chair—split apart by lightning—for a long time.

Still, Allen could tell that Master Danthe had acted with care. Even in that moment of crisis, he had gone to great lengths to ensure Bond suffered no further injury.

Apart from killing two helpless warlocks, the majority of Blizzard's effects had been channeled entirely into saving Bond.

Allen tore his eyes away from his companion's brutalized body and drew in a deep breath.

The fire in his chest—just beginning to calm from the slaughter—flared violently once again, and his heart began pounding uncontrollably.

"These damned animals!" he spat through gritted teeth.

It had only been ten seconds since Allen disguised himself and infiltrated the lab.

Out of the six warlocks from the Rissberg Group's Civil Cooperative Organization, four were already down.

No—

Not just four!

"Aaaaargh—!"

A sudden scream rang out behind him.

Allen wasn't surprised. He turned at the sound.

It was the warlock called Elisha. He seemed to be trying to get up from the floor—only for the suppressed pain, muted by adrenaline, to hit all at once. That was when he realized both his legs had been severed at the knees.

His scream was gut-wrenching. Blood gushed violently from the stumps.

The scent of blood in the lab grew thicker, nearly choking.

Whether Elisha would survive such wounds was questionable—but clearly, he was no longer a combatant.

Another tally in Allen's favor.

Allen's fighting style, if one were to describe it, was actually rather similar to a sorcerer's—dependent on charging time to unleash devastating skills with decisive power.

If Allen had the chance to activate Monster Hunt, and enough time to follow it up with Beast Roar, he could kill even a vessel of an Outer God. But deny him the time to cast Monster Hunt, and he was merely at the peak of a standard witcher's strength.

And the situation just now had forced him to fight at his absolute minimum.

Thousands of highly capable, tightly coordinated guards were positioned in and around the tower. That meant he couldn't risk using side-effect-heavy abilities like Beast Roar: Berserk—doing so would severely cripple him.

Bond and Danthe were inside the lab too. Using indiscriminate bombs wasn't an option either.

Which meant Monster Hunt was also off the table—too slow, too loud.

Assassination—that was the best, and in truth, his only choice.

And it had worked… far better than expected. Allen hadn't imagined he'd be able to reduce the enemy to a single intact warlock so quickly.

What could he say…?

Thanks to the Cat School dual-blade technique.

Thanks to Brett, the Cat School witcher who taught him those extra tricks—because a wider skill set always pays off.

That said...

To react even under the influence of Blizzard and Alghoul Decoction, and to wield such terrifying, instant-cast lightning magic...

That middle-aged warlock—the one Allen had only just forced to use two instant-cast gems—

He was strong. Very strong.

Far stronger than the current mage-source, Vilgefortz.

"This is the territory laboratory of the Rissberg Group's Civil Cooperative Organization. Who exactly are you?"

The middle-aged warlock swung a birchwood staff that had appeared in his hand—its tip mounted with a small skull, fist-sized and disturbingly human in shape.

Elisha, still screaming, was immediately pulled toward him by magic. Flames ignited at the stumps of his severed legs, and the acrid stench of burning flesh filled the room as his blood vessels were seared shut.

With another wave of the staff, the pain seemed to vanish. Elisha stared blankly at his ruined legs and muttered:

"I'm crippled…"

"I'm crippled?"

"I'M CRIPPLED!"

He suddenly looked up, his eyes filled with burning hatred as he shrieked:

"KILL THEM! KILL THEM, MASTER RONNIE! KILL THEM!"

"Silence!" the middle-aged warlock—Ronnie—snapped. Another flick of his staff, and Elisha was instantly muted, left only to glare with venom at Allen and Danthe.

The question was ignored.

Ronnie didn't seem to care. He looked around the blood-soaked lab, seemingly indifferent to the severed heads and ruined bodies. His gaze fell briefly on Bond, who had been rescued and now slumped by the door.

"Silver sword. Cat-like eyes. Witcher leather…" Ronnie murmured.

"You're from the Witcher Order. No—now it's called the School of the Wolf. You're witchers from the Wolf School."

"Dark red leather armor… a Wolf School witcher master, no less…"

His eyes swept calmly over the two Wolf School witcher masters, skipping over the elder Danthe and settling instead on Allen's face.

"I think…" He glanced again at Bond. "I think we might have had a little misunderstanding. That witcher of yours—Padrek Vasquez—he was the one who captured and forced us to do research. He's under Master Ortolan of the Chapter of the Gift and the Art…"

"We're just tools, forced into experimental work. Like how you use your sword—to slay—"

"Don't lump us together!" Danthe burst out angrily. "We swing our swords for humanity, for honor!"

"So do we!" Ronnie cut him off, voice resolute and impassioned. "So do we. Our research is to perfect the human genome, to improve our species—so that ordinary people can be as strong as witchers, but without losing the ability to reproduce."

"To improve the human condition, eradicate disease and disability, prevent aging…"

"The anti-aging elixir may have been created by Master Ortolan, but our Department of Non-Human Studies contributed too…"

He pointed to Elisha lying on the ground: "He invented the 'Elisha Malaria Cure,' and participated in… non-elf genetic research…"

"Quade was an expert on dwarven physiology—dwarven moss, thick-neck syndrome, and several infectious diseases transmitted from dwarves to humans… all had promising research outcomes."

"And Roman—he personally ventured into Black Death quarantine zones to study the plague's origin…"

Ronnie calmly listed the accomplishments of the warlocks lying dead on the floor—achievements that were, by any measure, impressive. Even the apprentices had brilliant résumés.

Whether intentional or not, the research achievements Ronnie had casually revealed were enough to be considered at an academician level in Allen's previous life.

This caused Danthe to hesitate for a moment, momentarily thrown off by the warlock's noble and resolute tone.

"You want to build your glory on the corpses of witchers?" Allen said coldly.

"I told you," Ronnie replied gently, his silver-threaded hair and neatly adjusted, solemn appearance making him look like a professor from a university lecture hall in Allen's past life. "This was an accident. We're only responsible for the research. The witchers of your order were captured by Padrek Vasquez…"

Ronnie noticed the calm expressions on Danthe and Allen's faces and paused for a moment.

"It seems you're not surprised. I take it Padrek Vasquez is likely dead then—no wonder there was no warning…"

"But I still want to say…"

"When a sword kills someone, no one blames the sword…"

"As for the casualties here… I swear before the gods, I will report it as a large-scale fatal accident due to experimental error. There's no need for concern."

"And even if I reported everything truthfully, with such violations in the choice of test subjects, the Rissberg Group's Civil Cooperative Organization wouldn't bother pursuing it."

Seeing that Danthe seemed slightly tempted, Ronnie quickly raised the stakes: "Even though the lab doors are sealed and no sound can be heard from outside, I believe by now, Evans is likely leading the Drakenberg troops straight—"

He didn't finish the sentence.

"Chirp chirp~"

A bird's cry, like that of a morning sparrow, suddenly echoed through the lab.

"Seems I guessed right."

Ronnie made no move, allowing the birdsong to echo through the blood-drenched slaughterhouse. "Masters of the Wolf School, I am a senior council member of the Sorcerer's Conclave. I'm quite confident I'll survive until the guards arrive."

"So…"

Ronnie looked sincerely at the two witchers. "Let me heal my apprentice's wounds, and you two walk away. How does that sound?"

"Chirp chirp~"

The bloodstained laboratory fell silent, save for the sharp cries of birds stirring in the tension.

"He's strong. Top-tier sorcerer level," Danthe thought. "He's already on guard and still has to protect Bond. I can't guarantee I'll succeed…"

He glanced at Bond behind him, then looked to Allen and asked mentally, "Allen, what do you think?"

"Do you still have the stamina to hold up?" Allen asked.

Danthe was stunned for a moment, then sighed inwardly. "Of course. I've rested a bit. I feel much better."

Allen gave a faint nod.

A basic "Blizzard" potion, even with its toxicity, wouldn't impact a witcher master's combat power under normal circumstances.

But the problem was…

Danthe had already taken heavy injuries at the Leshen's lair. Then he had rushed nonstop to rescue Bond. Even with a Swallow potion accelerating regeneration, the short battle just now—ending in mere seconds—meant the side effects of "Blizzard" would hit harder, placing even greater strain on him.

A small mistake could lead to disaster.

Otherwise, Allen wouldn't have wasted time listening to the warlock's long-winded speech.

He needed Danthe to rest a little longer—to protect himself, and to protect Bond.

As for trusting that warlock and walking away without a fight?

Turn his back on a man who had just lost a room full of fellow warlocks?

Was he that stupid?

And besides…

He had a blood debt to settle.

A mere four warlocks from the Rissberg Group's Civil Cooperative Organization…

Not enough.

Far from enough.

The witcher suddenly gripped his longsword tightly and shouted via telepathy: "Protect Bond, Master Danthe!"

"I'm going in!"

....

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